Starlight and Sand
by MidKnight Rider
Summary: Daniel and Sha're, from the beginning, some chapters follow each other, some stand alone, depends on the Muse
1. Chapter 1

**The Muse seems to want to go play with Daniel and Sha're now. I've been reading the Bill McKay series of books based on Stargate the Movie and it seems all Daniel and 'Sha'uri' do is fight. Not exactly what I want to read.**

**I also think the Muse is just avoiding dealing with the events of Meridian, which is getting closer over on my other story line - Sunshine and Shadow.**

**Not sure how long this will wind up being, for now it is still in progress. If you want more please let me know.**

**(0)**

A noise at the cave entrance alerted him to her presence. He had come up here – to the fascinating caves of Kaleema - to give her some space, some time to think. A month was not a long time in the dance that was courtship; or at least he thought it wasn't. But his relationship with Sha're remained awkward, in spite of his attempts to make her fall in love with him.

He was very very certain how he felt about her and not at all sure how she felt about him. It seemed at times that she was more resigned to their situation than happy about it. It seemed she had never thought about whether she would actually like her husband.

He didn't want resignation. He wanted the passion he saw underneath the lowered lashes. He wanted the spirited hellion he suspected lurked below the obedience that had been drilled into her by her culture.

He knew that Sha're had gotten the worst of this bargain. He was an anthropologist and could adapt to any culture if it fasvinated him enough. But he was utterly foreign to her, from his height to his eyes to his odd obsession with the pyramid and the caves of Kaleemah. But was it really too much to ask that his wife want him as much as he wanted her?

"Danielle?"

She had always said his name as if it was the female French variation. It had never bothered him. In fact he found it endearing. He hadn't had a nickname since his parent had died in his childhood.

"In here," he said.

She had brought a torch with her. It lit her as if she were a pagan goddess of fire as she came into the large antechamber. He had discovered the remains of a civilization in here and had the floor marked out in a grid. Sha're put the torch in the holder secured to the wall, adding its light to the ones he already had going.

She spoke in the odd patterning of English and Abydonian that had somehow become theirs.

"I brought you …." She began confidently in her own tongue; then hesitated as she searched for the English word, "food."

She smiled hopefully, wanting to please him. God, if only she knew how much she already pleased him. "Are you hungry?"

_Not for food_, he thought, resisting the impulse to let his eyes sweep over her body like a caress.

"Thank you," he said, then repeated it for her in English.

She appeared to consider it, rolling the odd combination of sounds around in her head. But all she offered him was a shy smile.

She put the basket down on the makeshift table he had made from a crate. Daniel watched her, captivated. The mass of black hair – the same iridescent color as a blackbird's wing – framed her lovely face. She lifted her eyes and her black velvet gaze met his. She stood for a moment, twisting her laced fingers and looking so beautiful and vulnerable that it was all Daniel could do not to rush over and pull her into a comforting embrace.

Letting out huge sigh, Sha're boldly walked up to him, put her hands on his chest, rose up high on her toes and pressed her closed lips against his. Then she stopped abruptly, scampered back out of his reach and eyed him warily.

They had kissed before. But he had always initiated it and made certain that he was tender and reverent and almost chaste. As a kiss, this one had left a lot to be desired.

As a kiss from a woman he wanted with an almost desperate passion it made his breathing come hard and his body harder.

"Danielle?" she asked cautiously, "Aren't you going to do anything?"

It took him a moment to sort out the garbled English and Abydonian.

He tried a soothing smile, forced his body to relax and carefully answered.

"I'm too terrified that I'll say or do something stupid and you won't want to kiss me again."

Sha're stared at him, wide-eyed.

"You want me to kiss you again."

"Very much."

She continued to regard him uncertainly. Then her hands fluttered in a gesture of exasperated helplessness.

"I don't know how."

"But you just did," he protested.

"Not very well," she murmured.

Considering his physical response he decided not to answer that. He abandoned language to study her carefully. Her enticing feminine frame was tense with frustration, embarrassment; and something in her midnight eyes that knocked the wind out of him.

Longing.

"I don't want you to laugh at me," she said.

Daniel's eyes widened. _She_ was the one alwayslaughing at _him_ for one thing or another.

"_Habibi_, laughing is the last thing that occurs to me to do," he murmured. "If it helps, I don't want you to laugh at me either."

Sha're looked puzzled.

"You don't?"

"Of course not," he answered, in that voice that had charmed people in the past and he hoped worked for him now.

Sha're would yield to him if he demanded it. He had always known that. She was conditioned to obey.

It wasn't what he wanted and never had been.

_Enough,_ Daniel thought. _Jackson, you're an idiot._

Sha're was over her head in this and he had been waiting for her. Of course, he could count his own sexual experience on one hand and not use all his fingers, but it had been utterly foolish of him to expect Sha're to welcome him to her bed as if she knew what she was doing.

As if she had ever thought she had a choice.

Daniel held out his hand.

"Come here," he said, quietly.

Sha're's eyes flickered once toward the exit to the cave. Then he saw the way her spine stiffened with resolve and she walked to him without hesitation. He set his hands on her hips and pulled her closer. The top of her head barely reached his heart. He tipped her chin up to look in his eyes.

"We've kissed before," he reminded her, "Like this." He brushed his lips cautiously, delicately, against the corner of her mouth and waited while she repeated it; "and like this." He pushed the glorious mass of her hair out of the way and bent over to kiss her throat, just below her ear; and stayed bent over so she could do the same to him.

He feathered kisses over her face and neck and ground his teeth together to keep his body from over reacting to the wonderful way she imitated him. She recreated each tender move until he kissed her and felt the tip of her tongue cautiously flick against his lips. Then he fastened his mouth on hers and kissed her in earnest, asking for entrance and finding it granted. His tongue danced restlessly with hers. He kissed her with all the yearning that had been building in him for the past month and for all the long years before, wanting someone to love – someone who loved him back. He kissed her and his hands began to roam over her back and hips, up the curve of her waist to hesitate just below the swell of her breasts.

He kissed her until her hands slid up his back and curved over his shoulders and her moans turned to a desperate whimper.

And then he realized this was going too far, much farther than he had meant to. He eased back to a gentle kiss, returned his hands to her hips and leaned back to put a small space between their bodies.

Her reaction was immediate and shocking.

Sha're broke away, would have run if his hands hadn't prevented it. There was anger and frustration and hunger in her voice.

"You still don't want me!"

"That's _not_ true!" He protested.

Daniel brushed his hips against hers to prove his point. His body's response was too immediate not to be obvious. Sha're's eyes flew open and for a moment Daniel was sure he had made a mistake. His height intimidated her. He didn't want his length to do the same thing.

He put his hand on her lower back and held her lightly. He nuzzled her neck and murmured, "I won't hurt you. I would never hurt you; and _have mercy_, Sha're I _do_ want you. I just don't want our first time to be on a cave floor!"

Her anger vanished. She leaned against him and let her body get used to the feel of his when it was aroused and ready. She nodded. Her forehead brushed against his chest as she did. He tilted her chin up again.

"Bring me dinner tonight?" he asked, hopefully.

Her mouth twisted ruefully. He was the most helpless man she had ever met when it came to food.

"Yes," she answered, softly.

"Bring a blanket?" he asked, moving her hair to tease the skin below her ear with his tongue, "and candles and wine?"

She shivered a little.

"There will still only be a cave floor," she observed.

His voice was low and sexy. "In here," he agreed, "But outside we'll have starlight and sand ….. and each other."

Sha're smiled a little. She reached up and cupped the back of his head, drawing him down until his lips touched hers again.

Her kiss was all the answer he had hoped it would be.

(0)

_Habibi_ – beloved, Egyptian/Arabic


	2. Chapter 2

She hadn't been sure at all about going back to the cave. She sometimes thought it would be easier if Daniel would just demand his rights as her husband and be done with it. His insistence that so many things about their relationship should be her decision was something she found baffling.

The truth was that she laughed at him because if she didn't, she would drop to her knees in front of him and worship him the way he deserved. Everyone else treated him like a god, but she was afraid to. There was already so little between them that seemed equal. He was such a strange creature, stranger than anyone she had ever known. Alien and ignorant of so many things that were commonplace to her, endlessly fascinating and now destined to be part of her life forever. At least there was comfort in thinking that, in spite of his height and his knowledge of strange and amazing things and his glorious sky-colored eyes, he was after all just a man who was her husband.

Sha're only knew that she hadn't wanted to go to bed alone, not after the encounter with him in the cave that afternoon. She hadn't wanted to lie awake in the dark, alone and filled with this nameless yearning for him.

Still dizzy from his kiss.

The cave and Daniel beckoned to her. Daniel – this alien man who seemed to understand the mysteries of her soul and offered her glimpses of worlds full of wonder and excitement.

Wonder and excitement he had given up for her; or so it seemed.

A sneeze alerted her to his presence. She looked up at the cave entrance to see his tall, pale frame stepping out into the desert sunset. She watched him with a catch in her heart that she couldn't quite name as he took off his glasses and wiped his eyes and nose, sneezing three more times before it stopped. He was fine during the heat of the day, usually, but the desert night and the things that bloomed in it irritated him. It gave him a vulnerability that made him more approachable.

He straightened up, tall and lean. He looked splendid and her heart beat faster. He saw her and his entire being lit with delight. Her heart pounded again with yearning; a painful sensation that caused an avalanche of confused emotions.

In long strides, pale robes flowing to keep up with him, Daniel came towards her. Sha're's steps almost faltered.

"I wasn't sure you would come," he said, sounding breathless.

"Why?"

He blinked and considered what she had asked.

"Because I still think you're a little bit afraid of me."

Sha're tipped her face up to regard him seriously.

"I trust you, Danielle," she answered, but only in Abydonian, "and I wanted to be with you."

"Really?" he sounded so hopeful that she was startled.

"Yes," she held up the basket she was carrying, "and I didn't want you to starve."

He grinned happily and took the basket. Holding her hand he led her up to the top of a short rise. The valley where her people lived was spread out before them. She could see the glow of the evening fires beginning to burn. Their voices floated by on the evening breeze as it cooled the heat of the day.

Daniel had already found stones for a fire ring and started a small fire. He knelt in the sand, spreading out the colorful woven blanket she had brought and opening the food.

There was coarse bread made from a mix of grains that reminded him of wheat and rye and cheese that was nutty and delicious. There was also figs and a honey-covered fruit that was like a plum – the same fruit they used to make the wine.

"Is it all right?" Sha're asked, anxiously, "I brought sticks so we could toast the cheese and bread."

"It's perfect, _mijn schat,_" he answered, reaching up to bring her down on the blanket beside him.

She seized on the unfamiliar series of sounds.

"That is not English," she said, certainly.

He grinned. All that shy silence hid a sharp intelligence and an ear for sounds that delighted him. He watched her for a moment as she put cheese and bread on a stick and held them delicately over the fire.

"No it isn't," he admitted, taking the bread carefully from her and pausing to eat. He chased the hot food down with a swallow of warm wine from the animal skin container she had brought, "It's Dutch."

"What is Dutch?" she asked, as she began to eat.

"The language my grandfather spoke. He taught me."

"What does it mean?"

"My treasure."

In the last light of sunset, Daniel watched her bronze skin blush with pleasure.

"Did he call you that? Your grandfather?" she asked.

"No," Daniel answered, "He called me _kleinzoon."_

She lifted her eyebrows quizzically.

"It means grandson," he explained.

"What did you call him?"

Daniel laughed a bit though his eyes were filled with sky and shadows.

"Nick," he answered.

'"What does that mean?"

"It's short for Nicholas, which means 'victory of the people'."

Sha're watched Daniel carefully.

"Do you miss him?" she asked, quietly.

"Sometimes," he admitted, "I hadn't seen him in years. We didn't really have a relationship anymore."

"You didn't see your own grandfather?"

It was a foreign idea to someone who had been born to a tribe.

"No," Daniel said, "I told you, Sha're. I never had a family. I never belonged anywhere. I've always been a visitor in my own life."

It was, perhaps, the loneliest thing she had ever heard anyone say: to belong nowhere, to no one. The last rays of the sun cast his face in shadows – the long, golden lashes, the chiseled flare of his nostrils, his sensuous mouth. It was as if he was carved from some rare, pale stone. She wanted to touch his face with her fingertips, to stroke away the shadows and trace the fine lines that feathered from the corners of his eyes.

He took his glasses off and set them aside, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and fingers for a moment.

"You didn't give anything up to stay here, did you?" she asked.

He looked at her.

"No. I didn't walk away from anything, Sha're. I walked _towards_ something. At least I hope I did."

Her pulse quickened.

"What were you walking towards?" she asked.

"You," he said, in a voice that washed over her like pure water, "You and …..maybe….a home."

Sha're looked across the blanket at the sweet man to whom she was married, the one with the heartbreaking smile. The night was falling like an ebony blanket and the sky was starting to sparkle with stars. Each moment they spent together seemed spun from clouds, rare and isolated. They came from such different worlds.

"I love you, Danielle," she whispered.

Shock settled over his features for a moment, only to be replaced by a flash of pure joy mixed with trepidation. He moved across the blanket and his hand came to cradle the side of her face.

"Don't say that just because you feel sorry for me," he begged, "I need to know you mean it."

"I do mean it," she swore, breathless.

"Sha're, oh god, Sha're, I love you," he rained kisses on her temple and forehead and eyelashes. A steam of odd sounding phrases poured from him and she sensed without really knowing that he was swearing his love in as many languages as he knew.

Tears blurred her vision and she wrapped her arms around his neck and murmured something soothing in her own language. His arms pulled her close and the heat of his body set her ablaze, as if she had been embraced by the sun.

"Danielle," she murmured, "Husband."

He leaned back and seared her with his gaze.

"Call me that again," he begged.

"Husband," she repeated, a small smile tugging at her lips.

"Never stop calling me that," he choked, just before kissing her again.

"Tell me how," she answered, leaning her forehead against his, "In every language you know."

"I will," he promised, "But not now. Right now I need you to kiss me."

So she did, tentatively, trembling.

Daniel took her face between his palms, and not tentatively at all, kissed her back.

(0)


	3. Chapter 3

The desert surrendered to the blessed darkness. A pale moon, nearly full, rose over the dunes and moved into place among the stars. Sha're barely noticed. Beneath her hands, the soft robe lay against the muscles of his back like a second skin. Daniel stayed perfectly still and allowed the exploration and she reveled in the firm shape of his shoulders and spine. She trailed down over his hips and then let her hands rest on his thighs while she caught her breath and calmed her pounding heart. He had kept kissing her while she touched him but now he leaned back to look into her eyes.

Firelight washed over the masculine planes of his face and Sha're thought he looked glorious. All this power and beauty and yet he held still and offered it to her as a gift instead of forcing it on her as a right. A pulse thrummed insistently through her body, as if she was being buffeted by a wild, invisible desert wind.

Sha're shivered, eyes riveted on the blanket suddenly, afraid to look back at him. He lifted her chin with his forefinger, though she sensed that if she resisted he would have stopped. His eyes were a cool well, water to refresh her soul, blue even in the faded light of dusk.

"Sha're," even his voice caressed her," have I ever done anything you didn't like? Ever touched you in a way you didn't like?"

She shook her head and her mass of ebony hair rustled.

"And you said you love me?" He sounded so uncertain still that it melted her heart.

She nodded vehemently.

"Then what we do together should be passionate, joyous, life-altering. Two people who love each other should bring each other nothing but pleasure."

"You've said that before but I don't know what it means," she admitted, shyly.

He sighed heavily and stretched out on the blanket, letting his weight fall on his elbow. He put one hand over hers and looked up at her.

"What do you think will happen between us?"

After the briefest hesitation, she said, "I don't know. I have seen the animals, so I think it must be very undignified …. And embarrassing and uncomfortable and….and…."

"Stop," he murmured, squeezing her hand. "Sha're, my treasure, we're talking about two people making love; not animals mating."

"No one has ever talked to me about …. Making love, as you call it."

She could feel her face burning. Her pulse fluttered helplessly. Yet she felt safe, as long as he held her hand and looked up at as if she was the only thing in the world that mattered.

"I do not understand what I am feeling," she whispered.

"Maybe we should stop talking," he suggested in a voice like cream poured from a pitcher. "Making love starts with touching."

He let go of her hand and rose up onto his knees so quickly she gasped. Piece by piece, slowly, he shed all the parts of his Abydonian garb. He watched her face carefully but saw only wonder and fascination. Moonlight and firelight danced over his skin, delineating every muscle and hard line.

He stretched out again in front of her, still absorbing every nuance of her body language and expression. He wanted to show her that making love could be exquisitely romantic and fully aware; not hurried or 'undignified' but rich with passion and pleasure.

At least he hoped it could be. He wanted it to be; and he wanted that with her.

Her eyes traveled the long, hard distance of his body. Her eyes lingered for a moment over his groin and a wave of heat and desire almost knocked him over. He fought it down and waited for her reaction. His tortured breath burned in his lungs. He was taller than everyone here; and he had been in community baths often enough to know how he measured up in other ways.

She looked up at him and he saw the momentary flash of panic in her eyes. She reached frantically for his hand. Large and strong and long-fingered, his hand wrapped around hers, supported and comforted and took the weight of her fear and eased it. Slowly he brought her hand to rest against his beating heart, pressed it against his chest and laid his palm over it. The touch was intimate and hot blood soared and swooped in Sha're's veins, rose in her face and neck. He held his hand over hers until her panic passed.

Sha're took a deep breath and slid her hand out from under his. She touched his wrist, moved her fingertips over the soft skin and raised veins below his palm. His pulse throbbed, beating in rhythm with hers. Daniel had gone utterly still again as she stroked over his arm. She explored the rough texture of the gold-bronze hair between his wrist and elbow and then up to move over the curve of his bicep. Daniel felt her touch in every muscle and tendon and bone, not just in his arm but his entire body.

"Your arm is very different from mine," she said.

Daniel exhaled a breath he hadn't known he was holding and laughed a little.

"Yes," he agreed.

She looked at him sharply to see if he was laughing at her, but there was nothing but passion in his eyes.

"Do you like it when I touch you?" she asked, shyly.

"Very much," he said, sincerely.

Sha're's body burned as her fingers moved over his shoulders and collarbone, touched the lovely place where the long column of his neck flowed into his chest. The skin there was almost ridiculously smooth and tender. She paused.

"You don't have to be gentle," Daniel told her, "I won't break."

"No," she said, "You're all firm, hard."

Realizing what she had said, Sha're's face flamed like the campfire and he laughed to ease the tension. This time she smiled back at him timidly but with humor dancing in her eyes.

Framed in an ebony sky of starlight, she looked hot and lovely and far more intoxicating than wine.

"Do you want this?" Daniel asked.

"I want to keep touching you," she admitted.

"Then please do," he gave her a smile of tenderness and encouragement.

"You don't mind?"

"Ummm, no."

She caressed his shoulders one more time before gliding down over his chest. Bands of muscle. Ribs flared from his narrow flanks. His body seemed to pulse with a smooth flow of energy that traveled through her fingers and touched places in her own body she had never known existed. Slowly, slowly with sensitive longing she traced her fingertip along a downy line of gold fuzz and circled it around his navel.

Her sweet touch hovered and tickled and drove Daniel to a point of arousal he had never experienced. He was humbled, enthralled, amazed and mesmerized. It was taking aching effort to lie still and passive while her hands trawled over his skin.

He concentrated on Sha're's face, lovely in the moonlight. Her hair gleamed, darker than the night, cascading over the hidden curves of her breasts and shoulders. He was aching to touch her, mad with a desire that was tearing at his soul.

Sha're started to reach downward and stopped again. His breathing shattered into a groan.

Daniel realized the arm that was supporting him was shaking beyond all control. He collapsed onto his back. The sand was soft beneath the blanket and the sky overhead was now a riot of stars.

"Danielle?" she asked, softly. "I did something wrong?"

"NO!" he choked. "Gods, sweetheart, everything you are doing is so right I think I may be on the verge of a major coronary event."

She frowned, puzzled. She reached for him and her fingers outlined the hollow by his hipbone and Daniel couldn't quite keep his hips still. He'd always been sensitive there. Her touch created an erotic reaction he couldn't control.

He was throbbing with blissful, scorching urgency. Sha're let her hand rest on his thigh and studied the enigma of his aroused male body.

"That doesn't hurt?" she asked, hesitantly.

"No, it feels wonderful," he answered.

She met his gaze and even in the moonlight he could tell she was flushed almost crimson. With great care she cupped her palm over his erection and stroked him with her thumb. It blazed over his skin as if she had lit him on fire. His breathing burst scalding from his lungs.

He clamped his hand over her wrist.

"Wait!"

"I hurt you?"

Daniel sat up and carded his hand through her hair, cradling the side of her face and nuzzling against her neck.

"God, no, sweetheart," he murmured, "You're driving me wild with wanting you though; and I don't want to get too far ahead of you."

"Ahead?"

He grinned, a smile full of amusement and passion. "You have no idea how much power you have over me," he said.

"Do you want to touch me?" she asked.

Daniel had to swallow a few times before he could answer.

"I do," he said, "So much."

Kissing and caressing he helped her shed all the layers of clothing that protected her from the desert heat and the eyes of other men. Now when he looked at her she was just as naked as he. They were kneeling in front of each other, held by the other's gaze. Daniel was enthralled, enslaved, by his incredible wife with her black eyes and blacker hair, starlit and enchanted.

"You're the most beautiful thing I have ever seen in my life," he told her carefully in her own language.

Daniel put his hands on the blanket and bent over until the top of his head rested against her knees, supplicant and surrendered.

Sha're's heart stuttered and then beat wildly against her ribs. Daniel had knelt and exposed the vulnerable, naked back of his neck. In her culture it meant unconditional surrender. She had never seen any man offer it to a woman.

Uncertainly she put her hand on his head and fluffed her fingers through the shaggy strands of his hair.

"Danielle," she whispered.

He tilted his head up and looked into her midnight eyes.

"_Fair is the white star of night_," he recited softly, _"and the sky clearer at the day's end, but she is fairer, and she is dearer. She, my heart's treasure. Fair is the white star of twilight, and the moon roving to the sky's end; but she is fairer, better worth loving. She, my heart's dearest love_."

Tears filled Sha're's eyes. She cupped his face between her hands and urged him to rise. Unable to speak she kissed him. His arms went around her and dragged her against him, skin to skin at last.

He kissed her, savored her, trying to touch her everywhere at once. Sha're moaned and whimpered and clutched at him, fired with intensity and passion. His hands stroked over curves and satin as he suckled hot, sleek flesh with exquisite restraint. He tantalized her with little flicks of his tongue.

Daniel was on fire. His entire being longed for their pleasure. He knew she was ready for him, slick and warm. But he continued to caress and linger over the sensitive parts of her body that he had longed to touch. He breathed out in a soft, satisfied sigh when her fingers twisted into his hair to hold his mouth against her breast. The world turned end over end, drowning them in sensation.

"_Daniel," _she pleaded.

"I know, sweetheart, I know," he soothed.

He didn't want to hurt her, but they were both beyond stopping. Instinctively, Sha're put one long, slender leg over his and lifted her hips against him. He rolled her over, covered her with his body and took her face between him hands.

"I love you," he said.

"_Danielle,"_ she pleaded again.

Opened and surrendered she lifted eagerly to him again. She felt him hesitate and then, firm and hot and perfect he brought them together.

Sensation shattered into ecstasy. For a moment she felt a flash of discomfort and, completely aware of her, Daniel whispered into her ear and moved gently inside her body until it passed and there was nothing but him and a profound, absolute brilliance.

Together they dissolved into one hot, molten crucible of passion. Pleasure built and shot through both of them like a shower of falling stars. The universe expanded and expanded with wonder, even as it narrowed to an intimate awareness of each other. Sha're was staring into his eyes – pools of inky black surrounded by rings of cobalt – when the intensity imploded past the point of control. Her eyes closed and she was lost in a sea of starlight and sand. Her cries rang into the night and catapulted Daniel into the oblivion of sweet, blessed release.

Sha're was trembling violently and aware of Daniel holding her in firm arms. He was feathering soft kisses over her face and eyelids, damp with tears of joy and wonder.

"Hush," he murmured, "Hush, beloved."

His hands and voice calmed and caressed, reassured. She sighed and nestled into his arms. To have shared something so incredible, so profound….. Sha're knew they had just forged a bond that might never be broken, not by time or by distance or anything else.

He was her husband. She trusted him. She loved him. She touched his face gently.

"There was pleasure for you?" she asked, shyly.

"God yes," he said, "More than I have ever experienced in my life."

He stroked her hair and gazed at her adoringly in the milky moonlight and fading fire. She was sheened in bliss. She was heat and silk and welcome.

His wife.

His _wife._

Now that they had gone this far he wanted to give her everything. He wanted hours of long, languorous love making, encased in each other, cocooned in darkness. He wanted a long, slow dance into rapture.

He kissed her mouth and felt her response. Daniel smiled.

They had all night. They had the rest of their lives.

(0)

The poem Daniel recites is a Shoshone love poem. Blame it on his photographic memory and his eighth grade AP Literature class. ;-)


	4. Chapter 4

Daniel had never thought that an oncoming sand storm would be the least of his fears. The Abydonian people were in a controlled chaos of movement – breaking down tents, gathering loose belongings and children – as the violent red swirl on the horizon gathered force and moved towards them.

In the midst of this he could hear Sha're screaming. Without telling him she had left the edge of their city in search of a missing child. Daniel and Skaara and Aamil were looking for _them_ when Skaara saw the storm first appear on the horizon. His brother-in-law had barely pointed out the danger when they had first heard Sha're scream.

After that everything happened at once. Daniel had ordered Skaara back to the settlement to help with the evacuation to the pyramid. He was in the midst of arguing with him when the two women who had accompanied Sha're on the search came running from over a dune, pointing behind them and talking at once. Fighting panic Daniel had tried to focus on the jumble of words in a language he still only spoke on the most basic level.

Then two words had jumped out at him. _Khumussiru khinnaus…._ Devil beetle…. One of the few dangers that lived in the desert.

A coat of ice froze Daniel's soul. Then his heart leapt into his throat. He looked at Skaara and Aamil and saw the same terror in their eyes.

Then they were running, fighting shifting sand and rising wind. Daniel shrieked his wife's name so that his entire body shook.

"SSHHHHHA'REEEEEE!"

His only answer was another scream.

He found her curled in a tight ball near a nest of devil beetle. They were swarming her, and the small child she was protecting. She was screaming and trying to crawl away on her side.

It never occurred to him to hesitate. He was slipping down the side of the dune towards his wife with Skaara hollering for him to stop before he could even think.

He didn't stop to think before ripping away her outer robes and tossing it – and the vermin on it – as far away as possible. He pulled his sleeve down over his hand and batted away the beetles still clinging to her and then dragged her away from the nest. By that time Skaara and Aamil, against their judgment and everything they had ever been told about devil beetles, had joined him. Daniel stomped the remaining beetles into bloody pulp beneath his Air Force issue boots.

He dropped to his knees beside his sobbing wife.

"Sha're, Sha're, let go of Safia," Daniel begged.

"Sha're give her to me," Skaara said.

Shivering, in shock, Sha're reacted to the sound of the voices she knew. She let go of the little girl she had protected with her own body and turned towards her husband.

"Danielle," she whimpered.

Skaara picked up Safia and began running. Daniel stared for only a second into the glazed eyes of his wife. He ignored the smears of blood, the swelling of bites on her neck and jaw and shoulders. She was trembling violently when he picked her up and began running after Skaara.

The wind was starting to howl but he could hear Aamil's voice pleading as he ran beside him.

"Yyyyyou help, Daniel? You mmmmmake her well?"

Daniel didn't answer. His newfound people had spent too many nights around a fire hammering home to him that even one bite from a devil beetle was fatal. The nest had been mostly juveniles. He hadn't seen a full grown adult, but, Sha're was covered in bites.

The settlement was in an uproar as Daniel carried Sha're into the adobe house he shared with her. Carefully he laid her on the pile of blankets that served as their bed. Skaara had gotten there ahead of him with Safia and the child's parents came piling through the door right after Daniel.

Sha're was convulsing and Daniel was fighting panic. He still had a basket full of supplies left by the Air Force stashed under the table and he dragged it out now. He grabbed the epi pen without really looking for it, bit the cap off with his teeth and jammed the needle into his wife's thigh. His tormented heart beat out the number of seconds required to hold it there.

The result was instantaneous. The convulsions stopped and Sha're collapsed back on the blankets. Her breathing became less labored and her eyes closed. She looked almost as if she had fallen into a peaceful sleep.

"Do you still claim you are not a god?"

Daniel turned to the doorway to find his father-in-law watching him. Kasuf's eyes were haunted and his face was gray.

"Yes," Daniel said, impatiently, "Is Safia hurt?"

Skaara and Safia's parents had stripped her and inspected every inch of her without finding so much as a scratch. Daniel exhaled in relief and tried to get his thoughts in some kind of order. Kasuf ordered Skaara to go help with the evacuation, though he had to do it twice. Skaara stared in reluctant defiance at his father for a moment and then gathered Safia and her parents and disappeared into the wind.

Hands shaking, Daniel prepared a shot of antibiotics, cleaned a small spot on Sha're's arm and gave it to her. She cried out and he winced, hating having to hurt her even that much more.

"Will she live now?" Kasuf asked.

"I don't know," Daniel admitted.

He sank down beside her and wrapped his hand around hers wearily.

"Good father," he said, quietly, "I need water and soap and…and….and the poultices the women made for Halah when she cut her hand last week."

Kasuf didn't move from his place beside the door. He appeared frozen, by terror and hopelessness.

"Kasuf!" Daniel snapped. "Do you know how to make those or do we need some of the women?"

"I will go, Daniel," Aamil said.

Daniel was startled. He had forgotten Aamil was even in the room. It always seemed like that with the dark-haired little man. Aamil just always seemed to be hanging around, waiting to be needed. He ran past Kasuf and it seemed to shake the old man out of his fear-induced stupor.

"Whatever you need, son," he said and then vanished after Aamil.

Daniel wasn't sure his legs would hold him so he crawled to the basket and found the bottle of peroxide and a bag of cotton balls. He'd rather slice into his own hand than cause her any further pain but there was nothing he could do about it. All bites were automatically infected. He remembered that from basic first aid. They had to be cleaned.

Daniel swore the bites had swollen to twice the size since he had brought her in the room. In the center where their teeth had broken her lovely almond skin they were yellow with angry red and purple filled streaks.

The peroxide fizzed and hissed over each wound and Sha're whimpered. Daniel kept up a series of whispers and soothing sounds and comforting nonsense long after she lost consciousness. He called her his angel and his treasure and begged her not to leave him, not to leave him ever.

By the time Kasuf and Aamil returned with hot water and soap and palms leaves wrapped around something warm and aromatic, Daniel had stripped his wife of her bloody robes and had her lying under a clean linen sheet.

Wind and sand blew through the door along with them and they struggled to get it shut. Aamil had a basket of herbs and leaves and they both had jugs of water.

"Thank you, good father," he murmured absently.

"What do we need to do, Daniel?" Aamil asked.

"The bites have to be opened and drained," Daniel answered, "and the infection drawn out with the poultices."

He speared Aamil with the blue eyes the Abydonian people found so extraordinary.

"If you don't have a strong stomach you've got about one minute to acquire one," he said, surprised at his own voice and the command he heard in it, "If not then you're no use in here and you should seek shelter with your family."

Aamil got considerably paler. His teeth clenched but he nodded.

"Good father," Daniel said, "If you need to go be with the People, I understand."

Kasuf shook his head. "I will stay with my daughter. Skaara is with the People," he answered.

Daniel braced himself for what he had to do. He accepted the skin of water Kasuf forced on him, took off his glasses and rinsed the sand off them. Settling them back on his face he said,

"Okay, let's get started."

(0)

They worked for hours and had done all they could. But had they done enough? Aamil was curled up in a ball in the corner, fast asleep. Kasuf was slumped against a wall. Daniel had his arms braced on the nest of blankets beside Sha're's shoulder. His head rested on them in exhaustion.

They had gone through three cycles of applying poultices to draw the venom, draining fluid and washing the wounds with soap and water. In between cycles Daniel had laid cool rags on Sha're's forehead and stroked her face and given her another injection of antibiotic.

She was feverish, but not too much. As least he didn't think so. By the end of the third cycle the howling wind outside had abated, all the swelling was gone from the bites and they had faded to the color of bad bruises.

"Will she live?" Kasuf asked again.

Daniel looked up at him and the room swayed. God he was so tired.

"I think so," Daniel answered and dropped his head back onto his arms. His hair brushed Sha're's arm.

A long silence followed and then Kasuf said,

"No one has ever survived so many bites from devil beetles."

His voice was filled with wonder and gratitude and awe. Daniel didn't even attempt to lift his head again. He made do with opening his eyes.

"It's just medicine, father. Your people have been making medicines for thousands of years."

"Not like yours," Kasuf insisted.

Daniel gave a self-deprecating little smile.

"Are you trying to tell me the People are going to be even more convinced that I'm a god?" he asked. "Can't you talk to them?"

"I can hardly convince them of something I don't believe myself."

"Kasuf," Daniel's voice went up but Sha're moved and whimpered in her sleep so he dropped it to a whisper again while he soothed her back to sleep.

When she had calmed again he sat up and leaned against the wall.

"I didn't do anything special," he said, "I couldn't have done any of it without you and Aamil."

He paused and shot an affectionate glance at the small, dark man snoring in the corner on a pile of pillows.

"He always seems to be around just when I need him to do something, or when Sha're does."

"She was to have been his," Kasuf said.

Shock woke Daniel with a rush of adrenaline.

"What?" he asked.

"Before you came, Sha're was promised to Aamil," Kasuf said, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

Daniel started to shake a little. His mind whirled like a tornado and his body felt ice cold suddenly. The words squeezed his heart until it ached. Over the last few months Sha're seemed to have fallen in love with him, completely. He hadn't doubted it even for a moment; and he knew exactly how he felt about her. She was his entire life.

But what if her earlier reluctance had been the result of loving someone else?

"Did…Did," he stopped and swallowed and looked around for the water skin. "Did she want him?"

He was too busy drinking to see the puzzled look that past over his father-in-law's face.

"I do not know," Kasuf shrugged.

Daniel pulled his knees up to his chest, dropped his head forward and spent a long time muttering under his breath in Dutch. Kasuf probably thought he was speaking some kind of incantation to his fellow gods, but at the moment he didn't care.

"Daniel," Kasuf said, after he thought the muttering had gone on long enough, "She is yours now. Aamil accepts this and so does Sha're."

There was nothing he was going to be able to say to convince Kasuf that Sha're should have had some say in the matter. His father-in-law was a good man with a kind heart and Daniel had become very fond of him. But the cultural differences between them were just too great a divide. In Kasuf's mind he had made the best possible choice for his daughter and she seemed happy. Mission accomplished, next problem please.

This now lay between Daniel and Sha're and to a certain extent between Aamil and Daniel. There was nothing he was going to be able to do about that right at the moment either.

The next few hours would tell him if his wife would live or die. That was far more important than whether he would have been her first choice as a husband.

If he hadn't been, and she lived, he swore on his own love for her that he'd let her go. He wasn't sure what the rules were for that, but he'd make one up if he had to.

Kasuf stood and brushed at his disheveled robes.

"I will check on the People now," he said, "You should eat."

"I'll try," Daniel promised.

Kasuf woke Aamil and herded the yawning man out the door. It was dark by this time Daniel realized just before the door closed.

He got up, ignoring his complaining muscles, warmed some water over the fire Aamil had started and used the last of the soap and water to achieve some small form of cleanliness. Clean robes and a comb through his hair and he felt marginally human again. He started to reach for his glasses.

Then Sha're moaned and whimpered his name. He couldn't get to her side fast enough tripping over the hem of his robe and knocking over the basket of first aid supplies.

"I'm here," he said.

"Stay," her hand flailed until it found his and clung tight.

"Not going anywhere," he answered. It was all he could say because of the ache in his throat.

She tried to pull him closer.

"Hold me," she asked.

He started to argue and didn't have the strength. He lay down beside her and wrapped himself around her. He had done it because she asked but now he felt reassured by each breath he could feel her taking, each rise and fall of her body telling him she lived.

Sha're cuddled close, linking her fingers tightly with his. It was all he could do not to rock her. He made do with stroking the cloud of dark hair that surrounded her like a halo. _His_ wife…. His brave, beautiful, unselfish, resourceful wife…. She had called _his _name and asked him to stay.

"I love you," he whispered.

Sha're's only answer was to sigh heavily and squeeze his hand.

It was enough.

(0)


End file.
